


The Mysterious Box of Inquisitor Adaar

by Mengde



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: A little relationship stuff, But mostly clowning around, F/F, Fun, Gen, M/M, Silly, a little bit sexy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-24
Updated: 2016-10-25
Packaged: 2018-08-16 23:43:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8122186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mengde/pseuds/Mengde
Summary: Dorian is awakened in the middle of the night by Sera, who's intent on sleeping with Inquisitor Adaar and needs his help to do it.  Between her ridiculous plan, trying to figure out the precise nature of his relationship with The Iron Bull, and a mystery involving the Inquisitor, he's unlikely to get any sleep at all.





	1. Shoes

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! My fiance is a big Dragon Age fan. She's sick and she asked me to write her a story with Dorian, Sera, and Bull, and this is the first of (probably) three chapters. Enjoy!

With a start, Dorian snapped awake.  Someone had crawled into bed with him, and it wasn’t Bull.

He kept his eyes closed, pretending to still be asleep, while he gathered power for a fight.  Then he relaxed as a familiar voice hissed in his ear, “Dorian!  Wake up!”

Dorian opened one eye to look at Sera, but the room was to dark to see.  “I am awake,” he said.  “Why are you in my bed?  Have you come to murder me?”

There was what would have been a disturbingly long pause if Dorian hadn’t known she was playing along with his farcical question.  “Nah,” she finally said.  “I need advice.”

“Advice that couldn’t have waited until morning, when I’m awake?  And wearing clothes?”

“Ohh, that’s what that is,” Sera giggled.  “No.  Couldn’t wait.  Gotta be hush-hush.”

Dorian sighed.  “What do you want?”

“I wanna get inside Inky’s pants.”

He counted to three before responding.  “That’s about as much a secret as Cassandra’s reading material.”

“Shut up!” she pouted, punching him in the side harder than strictly necessary.  “Listen.  I wanna sleep with her, because _woof,_ but I can’t tell if she’s into me.  You’re our resident Qunari-fucking expert.  Help!”

Dorian groaned, sitting up in bed and abandoning all hope of getting her to go away quickly.  “Listen,” he said.  “Bull and Adaar may both be Qunari, but if you haven’t noticed, they’re not exactly similar.  Bull is forward, charming, and _overtly_ sexual.  Compared to him, Adaar is a blank page.  She’s _reserved._ ”

Sera made a frustrated sound.  “Ugh!  You’re _useless._  I’m going to die alone, never having gotten to sleep with Inky, and it’s going to be your fault!”

“Quiet!” Dorian whispered.  “These walls are thin.  You’ll wake people.”

“Why should they get to sleep when I can’t?”

“All right, all right,” he sighed, still whispering.  “Listen, if you quiet down and let me go back to sleep, I’ll help you.  Somehow.”

“Hmmmm.”  Sera hummed to herself for a minute, obviously calculating.  “Plan of action, then sleep.”

He growled.  “Well, first we should determine if Adaar even likes women.”

“Shit!  Never even thought of that.”  Sera slapped him on the back.  “Okay, so we need to look at her shoes.”

A beat.  “What?” Dorian asked.

“Her shoes!  Girls who fancy blokes wear shoes blokes like.  Silly things with heels and straps and ribbons.  Girls who fancy girls, they wear sensible shoes.  Boots, flats, stuff like that.”

“But we’ve been out with Adaar!” Dorian insisted.  “She always wears big leather boots.”

“That’s travel stuff!  We need to see what she wears at a party.  A party where she knows she could get some.”

Dorian considered trying to talk her into a less ridiculous course of action, then discarded the notion.  Sera had decided this was the way to go, and it was useless trying to dissuade her once she’d decided something.  “All right,” he said.  “So we throw a party.  Or more precisely, we get Josephine to throw a party.”

“Nah,” Sera said.  “Much easier to just break into Inky’s room.”

Dorian uttered a silent prayer to the Maker that Sera would not say what he knew she was about to say.

“And you’ve got to help,” she continued, exactly as expected.  “You’re an accomplice, now.  If I go down, so do you!”

“Go down for what?” Dorian asked, cupping his face in his hands.  “We haven’t done anything yet.”

The only response was a delighted cackle as she leapt out of his bed.  She was gone a moment later.

Dorian plopped back down and went back to sleep.

* * *

The next day, Dorian had almost managed to convince himself that the previous night’s visit had been a dream.

Then Sera found him while he was in the library, seated at one of the tables instead of his usual armchair, translating the Inquisition’s copy of the _Malefica Imperium._   “Let’s go, nudey-sleeps!” Sera announced.  “We’re breaking into Inky’s room!”

Dorian immediately glanced around the library, but for once it was deserted save for him.  Still, he made a vicious shushing noise at her.  “Solas is right below us and Leliana is right above us,” he said.  “Speaking only for myself, I can’t think of any two people who would be _less_ amused about breaking into Adaar’s bedchamber!”

Sera blew a raspberry in response.  “You’ve got no brain, then.  Little Miss Seeker-Boots and Sir Beardy would be just as pissy.”

Expelling a weary breath, Dorian said, “Fine.  You may have a semblance of a point.  Still, how do you ever get anything done for the Jennies when you’re so constantly _loud?_ ”

“With friends, of course,” Sera replied archly.  At the same time, an enormous and familiar hand landed on Dorian’s shoulder.

He very nearly jumped out of his skin, but through sheer stubbornness managed to play it off as nothing more than a twitch.  “Hello, Bull,” he said, not turning in his seat.  “How is it _you’re_ so quiet?”

A low, knowing chuckle sounded from behind him, one that did pleasant things to his blood.  _Damn him._   “Ben-Hassrath training,” Bull said, coming around the chair to stand where Dorian could see him.  “Every recruit is taught how to make a dramatic entrance.”

“How droll,” Dorian murmured dryly.  “So, did she also wake _you_ in the middle of the night and pester you until you agreed to help?”

“Oh, no,” came the smooth reply.  “She asked me this morning, over breakfast.  Said you were ‘bloody useless’ but that we still needed a ‘fall man.’”

Dorian glared at Sera, who was in turn glaring at Bull.  They both said, “Hey!” in perfect unison.

Now looking at Sera, Bull shrugged.  “What?  You never said the meeting was in confidence.”

“Arseface!” Sera said, punching him in the gut.  A moment later she made a loud hissing noise and began clutching her hand in pain.

Bull laughed and gave her a hearty slap on the back which nearly drove her to her knees.  “Right!  Ready to go –” he grinned at Dorian – “fall guy?”

“Only if you agree that I’m not playing that role,” Dorian replied.

The grin on Bull’s face went from playful to dangerous.  “I’ll just have to come up with something else for you to do.”

Dorian managed just enough presence of mind to mutter, “ _Vishante kaffas,_ ” and then they were off.

* * *

“So,” Dorian whispered as they crouched in the stairwell leading up to the Inquisitor’s room.  “Where is Adaar, anyway?”

“Off doing some shite with Prissy, Creepy, and Varric,” Sera replied.  “So the only way we’re gonna get caught is if we can’t deal with that guard.”  She nodded at the nearby corner, around which stood a single Inquisition guard whose name Dorian didn’t know.  The guard – an elf woman – was posted in front of the Inquisitor’s door. 

Sera glanced at him sharply, as though a thought had just occurred to her.  “Although we could also get caught if someone snitches.”

Dorian raised his hands in protest.  “Please,” he said.  “Does this look like the face of a double-dealing betrayer of confidence?”

“You’re a bloody Vint.”

Bull chuckled, deep in his chest.  “She got you there.  As for the guard – don’t worry about it.  I got this.  After I’m gone, give it ten minutes, and the room will be clear.”

Before either of them could say anything, he rose to his full, formidable height, then strode around the corner as though it were his rooms he was approaching rather than Adaar’s.  Dorian and Sera carefully peeked around the corner, watching, as Bull swaggered up to the guard, gave a shallow bow, and started talking in a low voice.

Within five minutes, they had disappeared into the Inquisitor’s room, helpfully unlocked by the guard.

“Unbelievable,” Sera said.  “How’s he _do_ that?”

Dorian, feeling oddly troubled, felt a frown pulling at his lips.  “He’s very good at working out what someone wants, or thinks they want, and giving it to them.  Works on anyone, even someone he’s just met.”

Sera nodded slowly.  “Plus – not that he’s my type, but even so.  _Woof._ ”

“Yes,” Dorian agreed, absently tugging on his moustache.  “Woof, indeed.”

Leaning in close, Sera gave him a light poke in the center of his chest.  “You still with me?  It’s not fun to drag you into this stuff if you get all mopey!”

Dorian forced a smile.  “Of course I’m still with you,” he said.  “I said I’d help you, and I will.  We’re not all evil bastards, after all.”

It wasn’t as though, he reflected, he and Bull had really talked about this thing developing between them.  As far as either of them had said, it was just sex, and while sex was nice, it implied nothing more than mutual attraction.  They’d made no promises.  For his own part, Dorian knew in his bones that this was by definition a passing thing.  It had to be.

They sat in relative silence for the next ten minutes, apart from Sera’s occasional moaning about how _long_ ten minutes was without anything to do.  Once it was time, they crept up to the door.  Sera cracked it open, peered inside, then nodded.  “It’s empty!  Must have taken her to the ramparts.  Then _on_ them.”  She giggled at her own crude joke.

Dorian didn’t laugh, but disguised his discomfiture by pretending to be absorbed with the task of rooting through Adaar’s closet.  It was full of a variety of outfits, most of them different variations on the unsightly beige thing that Adaar, for reasons unbeknownst to anyone save the Maker, chose to wear around the keep.

But there were no shoes.

“Nothing,” Dorian reported grimly.  “Apparently Adaar has only the one pair of boots.”

“What?” Sera all but shrieked.  She pulled herself out from under Adaar’s bed.  “But this whole plan is based on _shoes!_ ”

“Some might see that as a flaw,” Dorian observed.

She glared daggers at him.  “Shut it and keep looking!  She’s the _Inquisitor._   Eventually she’s going to have to do the fancy ponce-about with the rich tits in Orlais, and she’s got to have shoes for that!”

A thorough search of the room, though, revealed nothing.  There were no shoes anywhere.

About to give up entirely, Dorian turned to tell Sera that they might as well think up a new plan when he noticed something.  The bricks of the wall right above the bed’s headboard were of a slightly different color than the rest.  It was the kind of detail he never would have observed in ordinary circumstances.

Frowning, ignoring Sera’s increasing amounts of cursing and muttering as she tore apart Adaar’s closet, Dorian walked up to the side of the bed.  He laid a hand against the wall and focused his power into a spell of discovery.  To his eyes, one of the bricks began to glow with a faint, golden light.

He pressed his palm against it.  It gave way, sliding with a quiet grinding noise into the wall, before the rest of the discolored bricks swung out.

Behind them was a small space within the wall, just big enough for the heavy-looking, chained-up, padlocked, iron-banded box inside.

“Sera!” he hissed.  “Look at this!”

She looked up from the closet and all but squealed.  “Andraste’s knickers, _yes!_   How’d you find that?”

“Purely by chance,” Dorian replied, not sure what to do next.  Breaking into Adaar’s room to look at her shoes was one thing, but this was very clearly meant to be hidden, kept secret.  He wasn’t sure if he felt right trying to open it.

Sera clearly had no such compunctions.  She leapt onto the bed, hands darting into her belt for her lockpicks, and was moments away from starting in on the box when Bull suddenly appeared in the balcony window, rapping furiously on it.  The two of them stared at him in mute surprise until Dorian recovered and moved to open it.

“We have to go,” Bull said.  “Right now.  I was on the ramparts with – well, we never actually exchanged names.  But I saw Adaar’s party coming back!  They’re at the front gate now.  They must have forgotten something.”

Sera made a horrified noise.  “But we’re _so close!_   Look at that _box,_ I have to know what’s inside!”

Bull stared at the hidden compartment above Adaar’s bed, then looked with obvious dismay at the state of the room.  “Yes, it’s tempting, but we have maybe five minutes to clean this shit up so the Inquisitor doesn’t know we’ve been in here,” he said.  “We’ll have to deal with the mysterious box later.”

“But –” Sera started.

“No buts!” Bull said.  “You want to make it obvious that we broke into the Inquisitor’s room?  We’ll never get a look inside that thing if we’re thrown out of Skyhold for trespassing.  Let’s go, let’s _go!_ ”

Four and a half minutes later, seated at one of the tables in the Great Hall, they nodded casually to Adaar as she passed.  “Boss,” Bull said.

“Bull,” she replied.  She smiled at Dorian, didn’t even look at Sera, and kept walking.

As soon as she was gone, Sera leaned in close to the two of them.  “ _I have to know what’s in that bloody box._

“And you two are going to help me.”


	2. Plans Are Made

The next day, Dorian woke suddenly as an arrow thudded into the headboard of his bed.

Next to him, Bull muttered something in Qunlat, followed by, “Dammit, Sera.”

“Barely even light out,” Dorian groaned.  “What –”  He noticed, as his vision focused, the scrap of paper attached to the shaft.  “She could have just woken us in person.  No need to ruin the headboard.”

“She could have,” Bull agreed.  “But would that have been nearly so annoying?”

Carefully, Dorian untied the twine binding the parchment to the arrow.  In Sera’s scraggly handwriting, it read:

 

MEET AT HARRITT’S ASAP

PS I TRIMMED YOUR MOUSTACHE WHILE YOU SLEPT

 

Furious, Dorian immediately brought his free hand up to inspect his facial hair.  He couldn’t feel any difference, however.  “Is she –”

Another arrow streaked through the window, landing barely two inches from Dorian’s chest.  It, too, had a scrap of parchment tied to it.

 

GOT YOU

 

“ _Venhidas_ ,” he growled.  “I swear I’m going to hex her, Bull.  I should never have agreed to help her.”

“You need to relax, Vint,” Bull advised him, rolling out of bed.  “The only reason she messes with you like this is because you make it so blasted easy.”

“What do you suggest?  Just let her run wild and not react?”  Dorian looked irritably at his ruined headboard, which would take quite a bit of finesse to magic back together.  “Or perhaps I should ask her very solemnly to stop because it’s bad for my frail constitution.”

“No, that won’t work,” Bull replied as he pulled on his pants.  “I’m sorry, but you’re exactly the type she’ll mess with.  You’re good-natured, but you can be a bit of a shit.  That makes it fun to take the piss out of you.  You’re kind, so you won’t actually try to kill her if one of her pranks goes wrong.  And you get flustered, but try to hide it.”

Getting into his own clothes, Dorian asked, “So what’s your secret then, Bull?  I don’t see Sera doing this to _you._ ”

The big Qunari turned to look at him, an evil glint in his eye.  “Mutually assured destruction.”

Dorian opened his mouth to inquire further, then clicked it shut.  That actually made perfect sense.

Fully dressed, they made their way to the Inquisition undercroft.  Sera was already there, waiting for them, with a sleepy-looking Harritt.  The smith glanced at them as they entered.  “So.  You two’re the other members of this scheme?”  He turned to Bull.  “The Vint I get, but you?”

“I say, now –” Dorian started.

“We said we’d help her,” Bull cut him off, addressing Harritt.  “A man’s word is his bond, right?”

The grumpy smith scowled.  “Well, I can appreciate that.  So, go ahead.”

Dorian blinked.  “With what?”

“Your part of the plan, stupid,” Sera said.

Chuckling, Bull reminded her, “You haven’t told us our part yet.”

“Oops!  Guess _I’m_ the stupid one.”  Sera gave an exaggerated forehead slap.  “Right.  Dorian, you use your magic thingy to make a picture of the box.  Bull, you use your spy detail memory thingy to tell him what he’s remembering wrong, so he can change it.”

“I only know what the front and top of the box are like,” Dorian said, beginning to grasp where Sera was going with this.

Bull shook his head.  “That part doesn’t matter.  So long as Adaar only _looks_ at the fake, she won’t notice.  Where the plan falls apart is in the eventuality that she opens it.”

“But she won’t,” Sera said.  “Even if we take longer than an afternoon to get it open, she won’t.  Stuff like that, all hidden, isn’t for opening.  It’s for knowing it’s there, safe and sound, so you can look at it once and a while.  Opening means you might get caught with it open.”

“Shit.”  Bull laughed.  “You’re right.  I must be getting soft.”

With a sigh, Dorian closed his eyes.  Clearly, Sera’s plan was to replace the real box, to give her time to work through the lock and any other defenses on it without having to worry about being caught in Adaar’s room.  The sooner he made it happen, the sooner he would be free of the rashly-given promise he’d made her.

So, he summoned the image of the box in his mind’s eye, and let it flow outward in much the same way he conjured fireballs and walls of force.

Opening his eyes, he looked at the image he’d conjured, and found he was satisfied with it.

Bull, of course, was not.  “The lock was about ten percent smaller.  The iron banding was pitted, here, here, and here.  The grain of the wood had an unusual swirling pattern here.  The chains were made of a darker metal, probably unpolished stormheart.  Add a small dent to the right of the lock; I think the key was forced against that spot.  Probably Adaar tried to open the box while she was agitated, and missed.”

As Bull spoke, Dorian made the adjustments.  “All right,” he said.  “Better?”

“Passable,” Bull replied.  “No way to do better unless we got a second look at the original.”

“All right!” Sera exclaimed.  “Can you make this, Grumbly?”

Harritt shot her a dirty look.  “Give me a minute to make a sketch, and take dimensions.  I’ll have it ready tomorrow morning.”

“One question,” Dorian said.  “What are you getting out of this?  You’re loyal to the Herald.”

The smith nodded.  “I am.  And ordinarily I’d not come anywhere near a scheme like this.  But…”  He looked furtively around, as though Dagna might pop out of the storage chest or from behind a smithing apparatus.

“But,” he continued, “I _have_ to find out what’s in this _bloody box!_ ”

* * *

“So,” Sera said as they settled down at a corner table in the tavern.  “Inky’s got a git to judge tomorrow at noon.  That’s when we do it.”

“There’ll be people who might not be at the judgment,” Dorian pointed out.  “People who might notice us slinking around on the battlements to get into Adaar’s room.”

Sera nodded.  “Guards won't be a problem.  The shift change is at noon, so we'll have maybe ten minutes of clearance from them, and most everyone else will be at the judging - it's mandatory for rank-and-file.  I know Fur-coat, Sister Scary, and Goldy Nice-Nice will all be there.  Baldy never leaves his room, with all the stupid paintings he’s working on, so he won’t be a problem.  Varric’s going to watch the judging from that table he likes so much, so he’s out too.”

“So that leaves Viv, Blackwall, Cassandra, and Cole as potential threats,” Bull observed.  “Ideas?”

Now Sera grinned.  “We set up little _distractions_ for them.  Keep ’em out of our hair while we get it done.”  Then she grew serious again.  “Well.  We set up distractions for Prissy, Sir Beardy, and Little Miss Seeker-Boots, anyway.  No idea what to do about Creepy.”

That _was_ a good point.  Dorian pursed his lips, thinking.  It was impossible to know where Cole was at any given time, given that he could be invisible and blink from place to place at will – or at least move and then make someone forget he’d moved; Dorian still wasn’t clear which it was.  There was no guarantee he’d try to stop them or raise an alarm if he saw what they were doing, but there was no guarantee in the other direction, either.

“I have a thought,” he finally said.  “There’s a spell I know which might help.  It’s got rather a long casting time, so it’s useless for combat, but it makes everyone within a magic circle invisible to spirits for a short time.  Ten, fifteen minutes at the most.”

“What good is that?” Sera asked.  “Magic circles don’t move!”

This was the part he knew was going to either make or break the plan, depending on how Sera and Bull reacted to it.  “The formula doesn’t require a chalk or inscribed circle, necessarily,” he replied.  “Any sort of circle should theoretically do.  Such as a circle of rope, tied around our waists.”

“That’s _three_ circles!” Sera protested.

“No,” Dorian countered.  “ _One_ rope.  Tied around _all_ of us.”

Bull leaned forward.  “So the plan is for us to get distractions in order, then do a six-legged walk across the battlements in broad daylight to steal Adaar’s stuff?”

“It’s looking that way,” Dorian confirmed.

The Qunari leaned back with a hearty laugh.  “I love it.”

“Why doesn’t just one of us – like, say, _me_ – go in?” Sera asked.

Dorian raised an eyebrow.  “Not to put too fine a point on it, Sera, but what guarantee have Bull and I that you’ll not simply spirit the box away and keep its secret to yourself, to be revealed only in exchange for additional favors?”

She stuck her tongue out at him.  “Arseface.”

“Exactly,” Bull said, still chuckling.  “And let’s face it – if more than one of us is going in, both Dorian and I aren’t going to be the one left behind.  It’s all of us, or none of us.”

“All right, fine,” Sera groused.  “You caught me.  Now, distractions.”

“What did you have in mind?” Dorian asked.

She gave him a positively evil grin.

“I need a bookcase, a sign, a piece of parchment, a quill and ink, and a fistful of paralyzing powder from Sister Scary’s supplies.”

Bull laughed again.  “This,” he said, “is gonna be good.”


	3. The Box Is Opened

Cassandra Pentaghast woke on her thin cot, rolled over, and reached for _Swords and Shields II: Andrastian Penitence._   She’d been rereading the series over the last few weeks, enjoying the quiet half hour before she rose and began the day’s work.  Here, there was no chance of being caught.

She frowned when she realized the book was not on the low table next to her cot.

Thinking that she might have put it away, she moved to the chest where she kept her books.  Given her relationship with Varric, her fondness for his writing was certainly the most embarrassing part of her bookish vices.  However, his was far from the only work of dubious literary significance in her possession.  _Lord Darcius Takes a Bride, Chasind Bride, Slave-Bride of Magister Sadian_ – now that she considered it, there really was a lot to do with brides in her collection.

The chest was empty.

Cassandra felt the blood drain from her face.

A snarl on her lips, she exploded into the Skyhold courtyard.  She was going to find whoever stole from her, she was going to hurt them in ways they had never imagined they _could_ be hurt, and –

Abruptly, Cassandra realized that everyone was looking at her.  No, not everyone – the women.  Serving women, ladies-in-waiting for visiting nobles, mercenaries, gardeners, knights, spies, practically every woman in Skyhold.

Some of them had books.  _Familiar_ books.

Cassandra stormed up to the nearest one, an elf in a chain shirt and tooled leather.  She wore the colors of a Red Iron mercenary, and was holding Cassandra’s copy of _Desire Demon’s Bride._

“Seeker,” the mercenary said.  “Is everything all right?”

“Where,” Cassandra asked, her voice full of threat, “did you get that?”

The mercenary looked confused.  “From your sharing library, of course.  The one you put up last night.  In the Great Hall?”

Cassandra bolted.  She took the stairs three at a time, rushed through the huge doors –

“NO!” she shouted.

Set up next to the door to Josephine’s office was a bookcase, containing her purloined novels.  Hanging on the wall next to it was a sign in several languages.

SHARING LIBRARY!

READ AND ENJOY – BUT BE SURE TO RETURN.

CASSANDRA PENTAGHAST 

Almost every book was gone.

Startled by Cassandra’s violent exclamation, Josephine whirled around.  Cassandra noted that the Antivan woman was clutching _The Seven Brides of the Arishok_ to her chest.  “Oh!” Josephine said.  “Seeker Pentaghast!  I –”

“Who did this?” Cassandra bellowed.  “I would _never_ do this, EVER!  Who is going to DIE today?”

“I don’t know,” Josephine said, shrinking back from Cassandra’s wrath.  “Perhaps there has been some mistake –”

Cassandra snatched the book from Josephine, slammed it into place on the bookcase, then picked the entire thing up and began carrying it back to her quarters.

She would make it safe, and then she would reclaim her books from everyone who had borrowed one.

And _then,_ she was going to commit a fully justified murder.

 

* * *

Knowing that the Inquisitor was passing a judgment today, Vivienne made a point of rising early.  She had no interest in the judgment itself, or the man on trial, but lords and ladies from both Orlais and Ferelden were expected to be in attendance.  She planned to be seen about Skyhold.

She performed her morning toilette, making do with the barbaric accommodations.  Deciding that she must glow today – particularly to anger Marquise Yvette, who she knew had made spiteful comments about her continuing beauty – she applied a face mask, sliced a pair of thin cucumber strips, laid down on her divan, and settled the strips over her eyes.  The sounds of morning training in the courtyard below were audible from her balcony, but she ignored the racket, listening instead for telltale horns.

When those horns did eventually blow, announcing the arrival of the first noble party, Vivienne mentally prepared herself and stood.

Nothing happened.

It took her a moment to realize that though she was commanding her body to move, it was not.  She lay there, paralyzed, furiously wondering what had happened.  Was she sick?  Dying?

It finally occurred to her that there was an odd taste in her mouth.  It was somehow familiar, as though she had worked with it before.

Then she belatedly recognized it.  Powdered deathroot and deep mushroom.  When combined in a certain alchemical mixture, they became a paralyzing agent which was odorless and nearly tasteless, one that was absorbed through the skin.

_The face mask._

Vivienne struggled to move, to cast even the smallest spell, but she could not perform any somatic or verbal components.  She was effectively helpless.

She swore, mentally, using words she would never be caught dead uttering out loud.  But then she heard footfalls.  She recognized the tread of two of the elven servants.  With a start, she realized her left arm had slipped, limp, to rest against the ground.  Surely they would see this, realize something was wrong, and bring help.

“Looks like Madame de Fer has fallen asleep in the sun,” one said.  Vivienne could hear the laughter in his voice.

“We had best take her somewhere which will not damage her skin,” the other said, _her_ voice radiating pure evil.

Even as she was carted away, Vivienne could not help but be impressed.  They were managing to avoid cracking her face mask.

 

* * *

Blackwall was putting the finishing touches on a wooden griffon when an Inquisition messenger entered the stable.  “Warden Blackwall?” he asked.  “Letter for you.”

“Thank you,” Blackwall said, accepting the piece of parchment.  He broke the seal and read.

REDCLIFFE’S MINISTER OF CULTURE IS EXTREMELY PROUD TO ANNOUNCE:

PAN-FERELDEN WOODWORKING CONTEST!

DISPLAY YOUR SKILL! FIND ACCLAIM!

THE ENTRANT JUDGED BEST IN CONTEST

BY OUR PANEL OF HIGHLY QUALIFIED WOODWORKING JUDGES

WILL RECEIVE A TRUE RARITY:

A MAGICALLY-PRESERVED GRIFFON FEATHER!!!

Below were the specifics – time, location, and so forth.

Blackwall rubbed at his beard.  It sounded too good to be true, but he couldn’t pass on this chance.  An _actual_ griffon feather would be the highlight of the Warden memorabilia collection he’d been piecing together.

If he hurried, he should just be able to make it.  Quickly, he informed Horsemaster Dennet he was leaving on personal business and would be back tomorrow.  He gathered provisions, requisitioned a mount, got his gear in order, and headed out.

 

* * *

The time arrived.

One of Skyhold’s elven servants came to the crumbling, deserted tower where Dorian, Bull, and Sera awaited news.  “Everything is set.”

Sera made a delighted noise.  “Our little jokes have gone off?”

“Seeker Pentaghast is tearing the keep apart looking for her books, and has already cleared the battlements,” the servant said.  “Warden Blackwall left on personal business half an hour ago.  And Madame de Fer is resting comfortably in the cheese cellar.”

Dorian couldn’t help but snort at that.

“Then we’re all set!” Sera exclaimed.  “Do your thing now, Vinty!”

Deciding that ‘Vinty’ was worlds better than ‘nudey-sleeps,’ Dorian forbore comment and began.  He arranged the rope in a circle around their feet, raised his hands, and began the incantation.

It took a good five minutes, but the casting went off without a hitch.  He layered secrecy and safety into the circle, commanding it to let them pass without trace or hindrance.  As he finished the spell, he summoned the rope up from the floor and bound it about them.

“Let’s go,” he said, and they began to walk.

They got about two steps before they started tripping over one another.

“This is harder than I anticipated,” Bull observed.

“It wouldn’t be if you weren’t both so stupid!” Sera snapped.  “Walk at the same time as me!”

“We _are_ ,” Dorian growled.  “It’s that we’re going in different directions.”

Bull sighed.  “Okay, this is apparently more than we’re capable of figuring out on our own.  So, here’s what we do.  On ‘three,’ we all take one step toward the door.  Ready?”

“Ready,” Sera confirmed.  Dorian nodded.

“Okay.  One, two, _three._ ”

They all took a step toward the door, but their height differences caused them to take different-sized steps.  Dorian simultaneously felt himself dragged after Bull and pressed against Sera as _she_ was pulled after _him._

“ _Vishante kaffas,_ how is it this is difficult for us?” Dorian groused.  “Are we less experienced than _children?_ ”

“All right, time’s wasting,” Bull said.  “Both of you hold still.”

Without waiting for a response, the Qunari shuffled around inside the loop of the rope, wrapped an arm around each of them, and lifted them off their feet.  Dorian grunted as he suddenly found himself pinioned between a rock-hard arm and an equally unyielding torso.  Sera made a similar noise.

And Bull started walking.

It was more a waddle than a walk, but he was moving more quickly than they had managed, and he wasn’t tripping over them.

“I wonder,” Sera gasped between attempts to draw enough breath, “if all… Qunari hugs… are like… this.”

“Not all of them,” Dorian managed.  “Just the ones where they’re trying to asphyxiate you.”

“Whine some more,” Bull chortled.  “I’d like an excuse to see how tight we can get before you pass out.”

Sera made a retching noise.  “Nope!  No weird sexy stuff!  I did not sign up for that!”

“It’s not weird!” both Dorian and Bull protested at once.

They waddled through the door into Cullen’s office on the battlements.  The Commander was at the judgment, but an Inquisition soldier was dropping off a message.  He stared at the three of them.

“Weight training,” Bull said.

“Team-building exercise,” Dorian said at the same time.

“Weird sex thing,” Sera countered.

The soldier quietly backed out of the room, hands raised in a classic “not-my-problem” gesture.

“I think we fooled him,” Bull chuckled, and started walking again.

* * *

 

Compared with all the effort required to ready everything for the heist, the act itself was surprisingly anticlimactic.

They got into Adaar’s room, opened the secret compartment, and made the swap.  Once they got back outside, they untied the rope and were not immediately confronted by Cole.  They got their prize into the wine cellar with nobody the wiser.

“It’s not as fun when nothing goes wrong,” Sera pouted.  “Daring escapes are the _best._ ”

“Speaking for myself, I’m just as glad it went smooth,” Bull said.  “How’s it looking?”

Dorian shook his head.  “We knew Adaar is a good mage, but the protections on this box are frankly mind-boggling.  It’s a good thing we made the switch.  I’ll need the rest of the afternoon to unravel them.”  He looked pointedly at Sera.  “If you’d actually started trying to pick the lock, you would have been electrocuted.”

She made a face.  “Ew.”

“If it’s so magicked up, will Adaar instantly spot the fake?” Bull asked.

“They’re subtle enchantments,” Dorian said, continuing to examine the near-invisible threads of arcane energy woven throughout the box.  “Designed to go unnoticed until it’s too late.  We should be fine.”

“Thank the Maker for shite favors,” Sera muttered.  “Well, you started yet?”

“Yes,” Dorian said, letting a hint of impatience filter into his voice.  “And unless you feel like watching the box _explode,_ I suggest you let me concentrate.”

She pouted, but shut up.

For the next four and a half hours, Dorian struggled with the box.  He unwove tangles of force, dispelled barriers, avoided vortices of lethal intent.  Sweat began to pour from him by the third hour, but Bull started a steady rotation of cool, damp cloths for Dorian’s forehead and hands, keeping him focused and calm.

When the last thread snapped, he gasped and stumbled back, nearly losing his balance.  A pair of strong arms caught him, and he found himself looking up at Bull’s smiling face.

“Good job, Dorian,” he said.

“Thank you,” Dorian murmured, too drained to think of something witty.  “Sera, it –”

She was already hard at work on the lock, tools deployed, a look of furious concentration on her face.  Bull helped Dorian to a chair, then settled himself on the floor adjacent.  They watched in silence, Dorian enjoying the feeling of the Qunari resting against him, as Sera fought her own battle with the box.

This took the better part of an hour, but just as Dorian was beginning to nod off, the lock gave way with a loud, satisfying _click._

Sera had the box open and was rooting around inside even before Dorian and Bull came to their feet.  “There’s a bunch of papery shite in here,” she said.  “Probably to cushion whatever the box is actually for.”  She started tossing parchment out in random directions, digging through sheaves and sheaves of it with reckless abandon.  Dorian opened his mouth to say something, but before he could, she swore loudly.  “What?  There’s nothing in here!  Nothing!”

Then Bull spoke.  “That ‘papery shite’ is what’s in there, Sera.  It’s letters.”

“Letters?” Sera shouted.  She grabbed a piece of parchment at random, stared at it, then thrust it at Bull.  “They’re not letters, they’re gibberish!  Made-up horsefeathers!”

“No,” Bull said, still calm.  “It’s not gibberish.  It’s the written form of Qunlat.”

Dorian felt his eyes widen.  “Adaar has been maintaining a secret correspondence with the Qunari?”

“Maybe.  Let’s pick all of it up –” Bull shot Sera a look of thinly-veiled irritation – “and sort it out, and I’ll have a look.”

They got to work.  Dorian knew just enough Qunlat to recognize numbers, and each of the letters was dated in the upper right-hand corner.  He began arranging his own stack in chronological order, then moved on to Sera’s disorganized mess when he was finished with his own.

There were perhaps forty letters in all.  It only took about ten minutes to get them sorted properly.

“Well?” Sera snapped as Bull settled himself at the small desk in one corner of the cellar.  “What do they say?”

“Calm down.  I’ll tell you.”  Bull looked over the first one, lips pursed.  He got to the end, then shook his head.  “Well, I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news.  This letter is from a couple years ago, when Adaar joined the Tal-Vashoth mercenary band she was rolling with when she was sent to the Conclave.  It’s addressed to her parents.  It’s telling them how she’s doing.  The one right behind it…”  He checked, then nodded.  “It’s their reply.  Saying they miss her.”

“Why is that bad news?” Dorian asked.

“Because there’s no secret,” Bull told him.  “This is all personal stuff, with no value other than sentiment to Adaar.  I’d bet my one good eye on it.”

“You hide a diary under the bed, not in a magic locked doom chest,” Sera protested.  “And why would she have her own letters, too?  There’s got to be something here that’s worth all of the stuff she did to protect it!”

Bull gave her a flat stare.  “It’s standard procedure as a merc for your loved ones to send your letters back with their replies.  Keeps them from being traced to you by your enemies.  And do you really want me to go through all of this?  Look, I get that you had high hopes, but I’m not reporting to the Ben-Hassrath anymore, and that means I don’t have to dig through people’s personal crap for a living now.  Which in turn means that if I don’t have to, I don’t _want_ to.”

“But there’s got to be something in these!”  Sera was all but wailing now.  “Why else would she hide it, and seal it, and –”

“Wroe.  Her name was Wroe.”

All three of them jumped.  Dorian whirled around to see Adaar, standing in the entrance to the wine cellar, her arms crossed.

“Oh, _fuck_ ,” Bull said.

“Go to the letter dated six months ago,” Adaar told them, her voice quiet.  If she was angry, Dorian couldn’t tell.  “It should be near the bottom of the stack.”

Bull did as instructed, pulling a sheaf out of the stack.  He held it aloft for a moment so Adaar could inspect it.

“Read it,” Adaar said.

Looking painfully uncomfortable, Bull nevertheless cleared his throat and began to read.

“ _Wroe,_

“ _I know that we didn’t leave things on a good note.  I’m sorry for the things I said that night.  I was angry, and I spoke out of anger, but that’s not a proper excuse._

“ _The hours we spent together were some of the happiest of my life.  It’s stupid of me to say, but it’s the truth.  I know it began as a simple transaction, but for my own part, I’d like to think that the feelings we eventually confessed to were real._

“ _If I’m being honest, my mistake was telling you that I didn’t approve of your profession.  That’s not true.  It’s an old and noble calling, and at the end of the day, a job is a job.  I kill people for a living, you sleep with them.  I’ve certainly got no high ground from which to judge you, and even if I had it I wouldn’t want to._

“ _What I should have said is that I need more from this relationship, if I can call what we have that.  I need to know that when I’m not there, you’re safe, and not with people who could legally mistreat and harm you.  I need to know that you’re healthy, and not risking yourself by going to substandard healers to save what little cash you actually get to keep._

“ _But I couldn’t say that.  I didn’t have the words at the time.  And it wouldn’t be fair of me to ask you to stop doing what you’re doing.  Not when, if you asked the same thing of me, I would say that I couldn’t.  That I didn’t want to._

“ _I hope I’ll see you again someday.  I hope I’ll hear from you sooner than that.  I hope many things, and know that they probably won’t happen._

“ _Love, Adaar._ ”

“Look at the next letter,” Adaar said.

Bull withdrew it.  This one was written in the common alphabet, so Dorian could very easily read the two solitary words on it.

“ _I’m sorry,_ ” he read, before he could stop himself.

Nobody said anything for a long, painful minute.

“I’m not angry that you found the box,” Adaar finally said into the silence.  “I have an enchantment on the compartment; I knew as soon as you removed it.  I wanted someone else to open it and see it, because I couldn’t have ever shared it myself.”

Dorian nodded mechanically.  His mind was spinning, a single thought dominating everything: _I’m sorry._

Were those the last words he and Bull were going to exchange?

“Now that you know,” Adaar continued, “I’ll have the box back.”

Sera also nodded, taking the papers from a mute Bull and putting them back in the box.  She closed it, locked it, and handed it to Adaar.

As she took the box, the Inquisitor smiled, then leaned forward to give Sera a light, almost timid peck on the cheek.

“Thank you,” she said.  “I hope you know what you need to, now.”

And she left.

Sera just stood there for a few seconds, then turned to look at the two of them.  She had an enormous, cheeky grin, and her face was flushed bright red.

“Woof,” she said, and was gone.

Dorian and Bull looked at one another.  Bull spoke first.

“The Ben-Hassrath taught me to give my marks what they thought they wanted,” Bull said.  “Since Adaar helped me – helped me get free, I guess – I’ve been trying to give people what they _need._

“But with you, what you thought you wanted was so tied up, so tangled, in what you actually needed, that I couldn’t separate them.  I misread you.  And I’m sorry for that.”  He raised a hand, as though in confession.  “I won’t make you say it.  From now on, if we keep doing this, it’s just us.  And we’ll see where it goes from there.”

Dorian blew out a long breath.  “Well.  I…”  He swallowed, and reached for his wit.  “I must confess that you’ve preempted my dramatic speech.”

Bull chuckled.  “That’s my gift.  Making your life difficult.”

“Maybe you’d like to go back upstairs, and we could make each other’s lives difficult?”

The Qunari rose to his feet with a twinkle in his eye.  “Sounds good to me.”

They were halfway up the stairs when Dorian groaned.  “Oh, no.”

“What?” Bull asked.

“You realize what this means, of course,” Dorian said.  “What was actually inside the box.”

Bull hesitated, then groaned too.  “ _Love,_ ” he said.  “Or _understanding._   Or some crap like that.”

“Exactly.  We’re characters in a morality play.”

“I hate that preachy Chantry shit.”  Bull shook his head.  “Still.  I’m happy with how things turned out.”

“As am I.”  Dorian reached the top of the stairs and opened the door.  “Shall we go together?”

“Don’t lay it on too thick.  This is new territory for me too.”

“All right.”  He started forward, then halted as he felt Bull’s hand on his arm.

“I didn’t say _no_ to together, you know.”

Dorian smiled.

“No.  You didn’t.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed.
> 
> It did not fit into the flow of the story, but the results of the pranks:
> 
> Cassandra finds herself being visited by women who had just started on her books, and is surprised to find that not only are they not judging her, but they are begging her to let them borrow her books again. She makes a bunch of friends.
> 
> Vivienne can finally move again about eight hours later, but she smells like cheese for weeks. No amount of bathing or magic gets it out.
> 
> Blackwall arrives in Redcliffe to find that there really *is* a pan-Ferelden woodworking contest with a griffon feather as the grand prize. It is a million-to-one freak coincidence. He returns very happy, with a new feather in his cap (quite literally).


End file.
